O’Rourke Told The Dallas Morning News He Wanted To Win Support Beyond His Democrat Base This Election, Specifically Mentioning Republicans And Independent Voters. “Beto O’Rourke will recommit to delegates at the Texas Democratic Party convention Friday in Dallas, but flirt with independents and Republicans on the outside. … So when he accepts his party’s nomination for governor at the convention in Dallas this week, O’Rourke will give the sweet eye to voters beyond his party’s base. ‘We just have to continue to reach out to everyone. It cannot just be Democrats,’ he told The Dallas Morning News. ‘I’m going to tell my fellow Democrats that are at this convention [that] it’s got to be about all of us.’” (Gromer Jeffers, “Beto O’Rourke Rallies Dems In Dallas, Knowing He’ll Need GOP Support For Governor,” Dallas Morning News, 7/14/22)

REASON ONE: O’Rourke Wants To Increase Income Taxes, Corporate Taxes And Capital Gains Taxes. JOHN HARWOOD: “What sounds right to you?” BETO O’ROURKE: “I think you at a minimum roll back the worst elements of the Trump tax cuts. So the top marginal tax rate back up to 39%. If you were to do that, and in addition make some other structural changes to our tax code — the corporate tax rate, which was brought down from 35% to 21%, bring that back up to 28% — great place to start. And as you probably know, you generate hundreds of billions of dollars over the next 10 years. If you were to tax capital at the same rate that you tax ordinary wage income, like the waiters who are working here, you also get to some greater structural correction to a very unequal economy, and you generate the revenue necessary.” (John Harwood, “Beto O’Rourke Begins Filling In The Blanks On The Economy, Taxes And Entitlements,” CNBC, 7/5/19)

REASON TWO: O’Rourke Supports The Green New Deal. O’ROURKE: “Some will criticize the Green New Deal for being too bold or being unmanageable. I tell you what, I haven't seen anything better that addresses this singular crisis we face, a crisis that could at its worst lead to extinction. The Green New Deal does that. It ties it to the economy and acknowledges that all of the things are interconnected.” (Tim Hains, “Beto O'Rourke On Green New Deal: ‘Literally, The Future Of The World Depends On Us’,” RealClearPolitics, 3/14/19)

REASON THREE: In 2017 O’Rourke Said He Supported Bernie Sanders’ Medicare For All Plan. “June 15, 2017: Writes a Facebook post that says, ‘A single-payer Medicare-for-all program is the best way to ensure all Americans get the healthcare they need.’ … October 9, 2017: Jeff Stein (then a reporter at Vox, now at the Washington Post) asks O’Rourke if he would support the Sanders bill should he win his Senate race in Texas. ‘The answer is yes, I would,’ O’Rourke tells him.” (Sarah Kliff, “It Is Wildly Unclear Whether Beto O’Rourke Supports Medicare-For-All,” Vox, 3/15/19)

Sanders Medicare For All Plan Would Include Health Coverage For Illegal Immigrants. “‘We have to join the rest of the industrialized world and guarantee health care to all, including the undocumented,’ Sanders declared to cheers last month in Pasadena, at a presidential forum organized by immigrant rights groups. But senators who have supported Sanders' bill have rarely campaigned on how it would give people who are in the country illegally access to taxpayer-funded health care.” (Alexander Tin, “Does Medicare For All Cover Undocumented Immigrants? Depends On Who You Ask,” CBS News, 6/13/19)

REASON FOUR: O’Rourke Wants To Curtail Immigration Enforcement, “All But Eliminating Immigration Detention,” And Grant Citizenship To Illegal Immigrants Currently In The U.S. “O’Rourke’s plan focuses on curtailing immigration enforcement — in particular, all but eliminating immigration detention — and focusing instead on building up immigration courts and case management systems for newly arriving asylum seekers, while returning Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrests and deportations of immigrants already living in the US to the constraints of President Barack Obama’s last years in office. … But beyond the now-standard Democratic promise to pass a bill that allows the 11 million unauthorized immigrants currently in the US to apply for legal status and ultimately citizenship, and to expedite legalization and citizenship for DACA recipients and TPS recipients, there isn’t a complete bill framework here.” (Dara Lind, “Beto O’Rourke’s Immigration Plan Would Go Even Further On Executive Power Than Trump,” Vox, 5/31/19)

REASON FIVE: O’Rourke Said He “Love(d)” That Black Live Matters Sought To Defund Line Items And Dismantle Police Forces As Currently Constructed. SVITEK TWEET: “Here's O'Rourke when asked Wed. about '20 defund comments. ‘I don't think I've ever advocated for defunding the police.’ In '20: ‘I really love that [BLM, others] have put this front & center, to defund’ line items, reroute to services & in some cases, dismantle & rebuild forces.” (Twitter.com, 11/19/21)

In 2020 O’Rourke Said The “City Council Of Minneapolis Made The Right Decision” On Police. O’ROURKE: “So I really love that Black Lives Matters and other protesters have put this front and center, to defund, you know, these line items that have overmilitarized our police, and instead invest that money in the human capital of your community, make sure that you have the services, the help, the support, the health care necessary to be well and not require police intervention, and then also in some necessary cases, completely dismantling those police forces and rebuilding them. And I think the city council of Minneapolis made the right decision.” (Twitter.com, 11/19/21)

The Minneapolis Measure Was To “Dismantle” Its Police Force. “The Minneapolis City Council on Friday officially moved to dismantle its police force and replace it with a department of community safety and violence prevention in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd.” (Ray Sanchez And Pierre Meilhan, “Minneapolis City Council Advances Plan To Dismantle Embattled Police Force,” CNN, 6/26/20